WhoBobWhatPants

the fact that consciouss minds are capable of experiencing various forms of pleasure and suffering is objective i'm also not sure how or why well-being violates self ownership

If good and bad aren't relevant when discussiing morality then I have no idea what we're talking about. I guess we could keep going around in circles each asserting that morality is about property rights or morality is about well-being. "In order to know if the act is moral, immoral, or amoral, you have to look at whether or not well-being is being promoted or suffering is being caused."

The net result would increase my well-being so it would be good. Likewise, having a rotten tooth extracted by the dentist might cause some temporary pain but the net result would be good.

I'm not assigning my own likes and dislikes. Stabbing someone in the eye for fun is objectively harmful and bad irrespective of my beliefs.

Morality is about good and bad. The various forms of well being and suffering are good and bad in and of themselves (intrinsically). Consciouss minds are able to experience various forms of well being and suffering. Therefore actions are good or bad insofar as they promote well being or cause unecessary suffering.

Ok so we're down to a fundamental disagreement on the nature of morality essentially. I believe morality has to do with the well being of sentient beings and you believe it has to do with self ownership. I'm not sure where to go from here or how we can agree on a definition of morality.

Hrmm ok, I don't know why ability to reason would be a necessary condition for moral consideration. I think moral considerations fundamentally have to do with the fact that "minds can experience various forms of well-being and suffering." Like I mentioned earlier, an infant or a person with mental handicap may lack the ability to reason but is still capable of experiencing well-being and suffering and thus actions which affect them positively or negatively can be judged morally.

The moral component has to do with causing unecessary suffering to a being capable of experiencing such in this case. I don't see why an action would have to be bad for both horse and man in order to be immoral.

Yes you can say that the horse is incapable of moral responsibility/agency. Nonetheless, an argument could still be made that it is immoral to torture the horse for fun for example since the horse is still capable of experiencing pain and suffering. Much like the horse, a human baby or a person with a severe mental illness or brain damage may be unable to "contemplate an ideal, compare behaviors to this ideal, and consider consequences of behaviors", but that doesn't mean that there aren't moral considerations to be made regarding the treatment of the baby or the mentally retarded person.

I thought I might post this here since many of you do not subscribe to morality in the sense that Sam Harris talks about in his books and speeches. Sam Harris is offering a public challenge, and a chance to win $2000 or $20 000 by submitting a short paper (under 1000 words) that challenges the central thesis of his book 'The Moral Landscape.'http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/the-moral-landscape-challenge1 Central Argument:"Morality and values depend on the existence of conscious minds—and specifically on the fact that such minds can experience various forms of well-being and suffering in this universe. Conscious minds and their states are natural phenomena, fully constrained by the laws of the universe (whatever these turn out to be in the end). Therefore, questions of morality and values must have right and wrong answers that fall within the purview of science (in principle, if not in practice). Consequently, some people and cultures will be right (to a greater or lesser degree), and some will be wrong, with respect to what they deem important in life."

Exactly, like they explained at the beginning of the test, it's not about true/false right/wrong, it's about consistency. If you've ever done any critical thinking quizes you will see such questions as "if all ducks bark and sam is a duck then sam barks, valid or invalid?" You're not supposed to get caught up in whether or not ducks bark for real...

Huh???

Sure, it's about giving the quiz questions the benefit of the doubt rather than assuming they mean something absurd. For example, with the questions "People should not journey by car if they can walk, cycle or take a train instead" it is reasonable to assume they mean walk, cycle, or train when it is practical instead of when it is 'theoretically possible.'

@Lians, this may help you out a bit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_charity I'm interested in designing my own test like this (with more and different questions), however, I have zero programming skills; is anyone interested in helping me out?

I suspect they mean realistically walk or bike, etc, of course you "could" walk 1000 miles to get somewhere but it's obviously not practical. I'm also curious how the other tests on the front page prove your point? yea i disagreed with the The right to life is so fundamental that financial considerations are irrelevant in any effort to save lives question because the logical conclusion of this would be absurd; you would end up spending all the money there is to save lives and the net result would be catastrophic

I found this neat little quiz that tests the consistency of your philosophical beliefs. I would be curious to see what results people here get. It is rather short (30 agree/disagree questions) so I'm not sure how accurately it will portray you, I got 0 contradictions. http://www.philosophyexperiments.com/health/Default.aspx It doesn't evaluate whether or not your beliefs are true or false, it only looks for contradictions/tensions.

Great post, very well written, though the statement: " if a man wishes to find truth The place to look iswith the small minority of those who will bow in the face of logic and evidence" seems problematic. Since the number of people who believe a claim is irrelevant to its truth, you shouldn't look to minority groups, or any groups/etc to "find truth;" reason and evidence alone should be sufficient, do you agree?Also, you might want to be a bit more specific about what you mean by "their personal philosophies," it seems a bit too ambigious.

Thanks, I can't speak for the others you mentioned but for me personally I didn't think there was anything you needed to apologize for Whatever it was couldn't have been that bad, so I forgive you if that helps...